Transport Committee on June 8th, 2010

[William Henderson]

You know what? I can say that the perception may look like that, but this is a public RFI that we participated in. Eighteen months prior to this contract we had already engaged Kelowna Flightcraft, and the analysis was done by Boeing and the Air Cargo Management Group out of Seattle for this. So 18 months prior to this we were already down that road.

I know from where you all sit it looks a little strange. But I've been in this business for 21 years, and I can tell you that I wouldn't say anything to you that wasn't straight and very up front about what we do. That's what we do, and we'll continue, with or without Canada Post, to migrate our aircraft to provide service and stay competitive.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Thank you.

I have to go to Monsieur Laframboise.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Thank you.

My question is for Mr. Bacon.

In my view, the problem is still a matter of transparency. You explained earlier that when you do business with Mr. Lapointe, he is excluded from board discussions, which is quite appropriate. That is the way to conduct business. Moreover, the contract was analyzed by the Auditor General, who conducts audits of Canada Post. The contract was deemed to be in order. I am convinced that is the case.

The problem is going forward. I am wondering whether the best solution would not be to subject you as well to audits by the Auditor General, given the fact that you are basically a wholly-owned subsidiary of Canada Post. Have you given thought to issues of transparency, to your business relationship with Air Canada, when competitors might intervene in your areas of business?

[Stewart Bacon]

You raise an excellent point. I think it contains two components.

As my colleague indicated, we inform all of our shareholders, including our employees, of our financial results, which are consolidated with those of Canada Post and published. On our Web site, we deal with governance issues as well as the mandates of our committees and board of directors. We try to be as transparent as possible within the frame of our operations.

Those are things we do regularly. You asked whether we should be subjected to audits by the Auditor General. Under the circumstances, I understand why you asked that question. My position is as follows: if the rules of the game were different for us, at Purolator, and we were obligated to reveal commercial data that our competitors did not have to disclose, then we would seriously be at a disadvantage with regard to competing companies in our market sector.

[Mario Laframboise, Bloc, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Mr. Bevington.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

No, I'm fine, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Brown.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I just want to ask this question. Do you have the same mandate as Canada Post, that neither rain nor snow, nor sleet, nor hail shall...? And do you follow the same philosophy, gentlemen?

My first question concerns the contract. There were 120 days that they had to work in. So they needed to look for somebody who was available, who had the personnel, and who had the experience. Can you comment on your readiness to accept a contract of the magnitude that was being presented?

[William Henderson]

I can, and with 120 days to do that--as I said, I've been in this industry for the better part of my adult life--I can tell you, people south of the border doubted that we could put aircraft like that up on short notice. It was just due to the size and scope and capability of Purolator operating aircraft in conjunction with Kelowna Flightcraft's ability to put those online and keep things moving in that short period of time.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

I'm interested in the corporate contribution you're making to Canada. There are three things that I see in your presentation that you gave us this morning. First of all, you have 11,000 Canadian employees.

[William Henderson]

Correct.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

And I see from your notes that almost 2,000 of them are shareholders in the company. That's about 20% of your workforce.

[William Henderson]

Right.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

There must be confidence in the work you're doing and in the corporate structure you have that would encourage your own employees to participate as shareholders. Can you expand on that program? Can you tell us, how do you get people to be participants in that?

[William Henderson]

Actually how we get them is the easy part. They want to be, which is good. We just made the program available. And because we are a private corporation, there is a stock price that we record and communicate to all of them each quarter. So they are aware. We keep them apprised in monthly updates as a management team, and we communicate that company-wide to let them know how their company is doing. We cover more than just the financials. We cover how we're doing on health and safety. We cover how the service levels are to our customers. We want them to be much more engaged in the business, and for us that represents a significant competitive edge. It's working very well for us.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

And happy employees are more productive employees, so it's good all around.

If I could just comment, too, on your corporate social responsibility that you talked about. You talked about your programs and your charitable work. Can you talk a little bit more about that?

[William Henderson]

Yes. In terms of the responsibility, we're a significant contributor to the United Way right across the country. That's actually done at a front-line employee level where they get involved.

Tackle Hunger is one we've been involved in with the Canadian Football League since 2003, and that program is simple. Every time a quarterback gets sacked in a game, Purolator will donate the equivalent weight of that quarterback in food. So we're hoping there are heavy quarterbacks who get sacked, because we've raised over three million pounds.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

And do you weigh them before the...?

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Crombie, on a point of order.

[Bonnie Crombie, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

On a point of order, how is this relevant to the issues we're dealing with today? We're analyzing the contracting nature of these directors in their contract with Canada Post.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Mr. Chair--

[The Chair, Conservative, Merv Tweed]

Ms. Brown, on the same point of order.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Carry on, please.

My question is, do you weigh them before the game or after the game?

[An hon. member]

[Inaudible--Editor]